The Traveller

I love to climb mountains. I love the challenge of it, the sheer exhilaration than pumps through your veins when you start a venture. I love the sound of the strong winds howling by, the way ice in the higher regions pierce your lungs and make you feel so, so alive. I love the way it makes me feel once I’ve conquered a mountain, like you’re the greatest person on the planet, the sense of indestructibility that you feel at the end of your quest.

Every mountain I’ve ever climbed has a different feel to it, a different atmosphere to it, like different persons. The Gunung Krakatua in Indonesia feels more like a rough and tumble tomboy when compared to the Himalayans – so soft and gentle that just brought up this warm feeling inside whenever I thought of the beautiful sights that greeted me every time I was atop her. And Everest – she was the most dangerous woman I’ve ever met, beautiful, cold, and deadly.

The vistas I saw on top of mountains never seemed to amaze me. The world is a different place from there. It gave me ideas of what a bird-eye’s view was actually like. Everything just seems so small when you’re 6000 feet up in the air. But the view is simply amazing. I collect scenes from the mountains as a memento of the times I’ve ever climbed them and most of the time make a profit from them via turning them into postcards. Most people I know would rather just appreciate the sights without the labour, but for me the feeling when you look at a picture and when you see it and feel it just doesn’t compare.

You can see brilliant sunsets from way up high, and the number of shades that it can take on will stagger the mind. Sunrises are equally brilliant, depending on whether the sun first appears on the horizon from behind the sea or dramatically from the V in between two mountains. More often than not, the sky itself is a painting, since they can be seen so clearly, without the sooty dome of pollution from the city hanging around to block out the sky.

But the time I liked best was at night, when you could see the stars. They were different, depending on which part of the world you were. I liked it in Alaska, although it was icy cold and totally challenged the senses. It was a harsh place, one that really made me test the limits of my human frailty. But the beauty here was breathtaking. And the stars at night really made me feel the way 16th century sailors did when they mapped the way from one place to another by using the stars. You could see the Northern Star, the Three Hunters, Orion, and the various horoscopes that girls always refer to in the newspaper. As if the predictions therein were always true.

I first discovered the wonder of climbing quite by accident. The plane I was on on my supposed business trip to New Orleans had to crash land. Ironic isn’t it. Of all places it decided to land was this empty stretch of land that was – though we didn’t know it then or we might have simply hyperventilated – a dead volcano somewhere in the region of South America. Since a few people were injured and the radio was damaged, a few people had to volunteer to go down the mountain for help.

Long story short, I decided to play hero. The climb down the mountain took my mind off the traumatic event I had just been a part of. I had to use sheer concentration to keep myself from falling off a ledge or all my – at that time – flimsy strength to hold on to a branch to keep from falling.

The exertion helped me focus. Didn’t let me think about how many people would die if we didn’t make it down the mountain in time. That every second someone stumbled or tripped someone’s chances of living went down. It felt good. It kept me calm.

The next time I did it again, it was to escape the stress of work. There were no irate clients here, screaming for their documents, no bosses breathing down your neck because the deadline was approaching and the marketing team hadn’t come up with ideas yet. No phones that wouldn’t stop ringing. And so I climbed again and again. First to relax, and then I started to really enjoy it – once I got over the fear of heights and the huge blood-sucking leeches (hey! I was originally a city guy!).

Before I knew it, it had turned from a part time hobby to a part time job. My bosses back in the city wasn’t happy about it, but heck, I was so good at what I did that they just had to deal with it or simply lose me (I actually gave them the ultimatum: part time job or no job).

I would actually take tourists up and down the mountain sometimes. I liked the ones that really liked to travel. They were much more interesting individuals compared to the ones that went on trips like these to show off just so they could say: “Hey! I climbed Mt. Everest!” when they had barely gone up a quarter of the way. The ones that actually liked to do this stuff were easier to talk to. They were actually interested in the mountain rather than the glory of it, and I was more than happy to explain her various features: she has rather sharp features if you look straight up from here, this side of her’s a bit steep, so watch out, you can get the best view of her actual size when you’re up in the air, she really has beautiful rock formations… stuff like that.

But most of all, I loved it when it was just me and the mountain. I didn’t mind the peace and quiet at all. It was a rather…refreshing change. Up here I could sit and ponder for hours, sometimes daydreaming, sometimes just feeling. No wonder all those Chinese legends that involved meditating monks were usually set up somewhere in the high mountains. Away from all the noise, away from people…

Away from it all…